The Guild: Papers Past
by JFalcon
Summary: Michelle is an assassin teamed up with Sunny Wong to hunt down a rogue agent . . . Maggie. But Dokusensha are not the only ones after Maggie when her powers are revealed, and when both sides come to blows all of Hong Kong will be engulfed!
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: **I do **not** own Read or Dream, Read or Die, R.O.D. the TV, etc. The story idea **is** my own, original characters are either mine or used with prior permission from their true creators.

**Exploration Explanation Condemnation Exclamation!** (read as "author's note")

In the end this story is the sort that I know won't have a lot of fans, or reviews. I don't mind that at all, it is already written to completion so I will update one way or another. You see this is being done mostly for me, it's being _shared_ for the _few_ who'll find it interesting.

Our story is set a year before the paper sisters meet and pretty much just before their memories get altered. This story depicts the events before they become Paper Masters and have their memories modified to become the Paper Sisters. Sunny Wong is one of the stars so there will be violence. Oh boy golly gosh will there be violence in this story once things get moving! This is a work of fan fiction, it has no effect on the real material which I do not own and therefore there's no point making a fool of yourself and flaming me just because you dont like it and feel that it has sullied the face of R.O.D. the TV, but what the hey a flame is still a review so whatever.

The original idea behind this story was to "draw" Michelle as a slightly cruel Dokusensha assassin teamed up with Sunny Wong to hunt down a rogue Dokusensha agent . . . Maggie. But Dokusensha are not the only ones after Maggie when her powers are revealed, and when both sides come to blows all of Hong Kong will be engulfed!

**Warning:** Contains violence, death, crude language, more violence, and a tiny bit of romance.

**Part One**

------

She snuck up the stairs to her apartment, wanting her very existence to go unnoticed if possible. Her red shirt was ripped in a few places, and there was blood on her right shoulder. If her mother saw it she'd be in trouble, who knew what conclusions the often intoxicated family matriarch would draw from her appearance?

She reached the door, number 777. She remembered when her family had moved in, her father had said "Triple seven, the number for heaven! Our fortunes will be different!" As it turned out fortune _had_ changed. Father had fallen terribly ill and was unable to work. Her older sister had left for college just a few days ago. Though father was still lying in his sick bed (he had been for nearly five months) in the end mother was the only other person really at home.

As the young woman reached the door she opened it slowly, quietly . . .

She opened it just enough to squeeze through, the closed it again with even more care not to make a single noise. She could hear the news playing on the television, mother was either watching it, or had fallen asleep in front of it. The girl hoped it was the latter.

As she crept towards her bedroom she heard the reporter saying "Though there were no fatalities, several people are in critical condition" The girl shuddered and sped up her walk. "Police have no clues as to what might have caused the devastation of the down town library, but are unconvinced by eye witness reports that a giant creature, resembling a chimera, or three headed monster was the culprit."

The girl shuddered, and heard her mother scoff, "A shimera thing? What's this world coming to?"

The girl snuck towards her room even more quietly, but thinking to herself that it most certainly hadn't been a chimera, it had been Cerberus.

"And where have you been?" Her mother barked, not even turning around to look at her.

The girl mumbled a thousand answers in five seconds but none that seemed realistic, so she just said "I was out."

"You were reading." Her mother accused, and she wasn't too far off. "You're always reading. Did you learn anything?"

"Well uh--"

"Of course not." Her mother scoffed, not bothering to look at her, "Your sister studied hard and got into a good college, but you waste your time with any old book you get your hands on, you'll never go to college, and you'll always be here, a burden for me and your poor father."

The girl frowned, but was a little relieved that her mother hadn't turned and looked at the terrible sate she was in. She just mumbled a pitiful "I'm sorry" and rushed off to her room, grabbing a stack of books off the shelf and crawling under her bed. Maybe she wouldn't learn anything, but at least while she read she could forget all the problems in her life.

The people in these books all had happy endings, so maybe if she read enough and believed enough she'd have something happy happen to her too!

Or maybe not . . .

------

The two stood outside the office of the Dokusensha officer who would give them their mission briefing, a man and a woman both wearing black, the woman carrying with her a rather stylish suitcase.

They were an odd pair, he stood so tall and by comparison she was terribly small. She had long, golden hair while he had almost none at all, save the mohawk. He wore a pair of dark sun glasses to hide his eyes, while she showed her gorgeous green orbs off to the world.

Agents Sunny Wong and Michelle Chan were terribly different indeed, but Michelle wouldn't let that get in the way of the mission, whatever it may be, so she extended the hand of friendship and offered agent Wong a hand shake, saying "Hi! I'm Michelle Chan! I've worked for Dokusensha for four years now, how about you?"

He stood like a statue and stared right past her at the door, and after a few moments she retracted her hand, feeling just a little insulted. She wondered if maybe he'd fallen asleep under those glasses. She sighed to herself and went back to waiting for that door to open. Waited for her next assignment.

She did not have to wait long, as the door did indeed open and a small pudgy man wearing a strange little hat waved for them to come in. Agent Wong complied without hesitation, even knocking Michelle out of his way as he did so. Michelle frowned at his back and hoped that she wouldn't be asked to work with him for very long.

Inside the office were a pair of comfortable chairs, she flopped down into one and let out a content sigh. This would be the perfect chair to curl up in with a good book!

Agent Wong remained standing, and Michelle wondered for a moment if she should have done the same. But since she was already sitting, she saw no reason to get up.

The fat little officer sat down at a desk in front of them and tapped his head. "Oh my, oh my, agents Wong and Chan, headquarters must really want this job done!" He handed them each a piece of paper, it was a dossier.

The Dokusensha Dossiers were a comprehensive and efficient way to keep track of agents from Dokusensha, and other agencies and orders. It contained a person's picture, a brief biography and a list of habits. The dossier before Michelle however had a picture of a young woman with disorganized black hair, shy brown eyes and blushing cheeks. She didn't seem the secret agent type, but then neither did Michelle really. It had no list of habits, and the biography only said, "likes books".

"Her name is Maggie Mui." The officer said.

Agent Wong examined the paper, then tucked it into his shirt. He turned as if to leave but the officer snapped, "Wait! You do not understand the nature of this mission."

Michelle gave the officer a confused look, "This isn't an assassination?"

The officer shook his head. "You two will work together to find her, and bring her back alive."

"Alive?" Michelle blinked.

"Yes, you see it is a state completely opposite from 'dead'. But use extreme caution, she's terribly dangerous." The officer said.

Michelle frowned at the officer, expecting more information than that, and not terribly opposed to knowing _why_ this Maggie Mui needed to be brought in alive, but apparently the officer wasn't going to volunteer it. She cleared her throat, and when he still said nothing she asked, "What exactly are we dealing with?"

"You've heard of the odd occurrences in Hong Kong?" The officer asked.

"No." Michelle admitted.

"There have been unusual animal sightings, and just yesterday a giant beast tore through the down town area, destroying cars and damaging buildings."

"A Beast Master?" Michelle asked, looking at Maggie's picture. Beast masters were usually wild eyed, dirty and held some resemblance to the beasts they favored, a simian face, exaggerated canine teeth, a beak-like nose. They also tended to proudly display scars on their faces given to them by their animal cohorts, though how a ruined face implied control over the animals was beyond Michelle. This girl's hair was messy but she looked clean otherwise, and had no visible scars.

"No." The officer answered at length, "The animals are usually reported as being albino, or almost completely white. The latest incident had a three headed wolf-like monster that simply fell apart and blew away when it's rampage ended . . . or rather when it got too far away from its creator."

Michelle tapped her finger on her chin, trying to figure out what she might be dealing with. "Is this a new kind of unusual talent?" She asked.

"Mui is a Paper Master." The officer said, sounding a little embarrassed. "Our sources suggest that she lost control of her minion and it went on a rampage. When it got too far away for her to continue holding it together mentally it became ordinary paper again."

"A Paper Master?" Michelle whispered, trying to remember all the Paper Masters she'd eliminated in the past. She couldn't remember any, and she never forgot a victim, so obviously she'd never been assigned a Paper Master before.

"Agent Wong's mastery of paper manipulation should be enough to dispel any minions the target might send your way, especially if, as the down town incident suggests, she has no control over her powers. Your task Agent Chan will be to subdue the target and bring her in."

Michelle nodded, it seemed simple enough, she just wouldn't aim for a vital spot.

"It is imperative that we capture Miss. Mui alive." The officer added, looking at Sunny, "With all of her limbs, and organs intact."

"What about her kidneys? She only needs one of those!" Michelle offered to lighten the mood, realizing too late that it was a rather stupid thing to say.

"Both kidneys intact if you please." The officer grunted, fidgeting with his belt buckle. "I suppose you want to know why you're being sent on this mission?" The officer added to Michelle.

Michelle actually hadn't wondered. Obviously this girl was a danger to Dokusensha, who cared about the 'why' all she needed to worry about was the 'how'. How to kill her targets usually, but now how to avoid killing. She shook her head and said, "When Dokusensha calls, Agent Michelle Chan must answer, regardless of the mission, no matter how dangerous, no matter how difficult, I shall-"

"Yes, yes, good, good. Off you go then, hurry along." The officer said, shooing her out the door.

Michelle blinked, terribly offended that her speech would be cut short, but nodded, saluted and followed her new partner out the door. "How shall we go about this?" She asked, and Sunny Wong just ignored her and headed towards the elevators. "It's going to be terribly difficult to work together if you don't speak. Are you mute?" She asked, agent Wong continued to ignore her. "Deaf then?" She offered, but realized he wasn't likely to hear and answer if he was. She grinned, "Are you shy? Does my stunning beauty rip the very words from your mouth?"

It was meant as a taunt, and it worked. Wong looked back and raised an eyebrow at her, it was the biggest response she'd gotten from him since they'd met! Progress!

"If words escape you, then sign language will be fine." Michelle said graciously.

Sunny grunted and made a hand gesture that Michelle supposed could be considered universally understood sign language.

Still, her smile wavered only a little bit and she said, "I can see it'll be a pleasure working with you." Closing her eyes in surrender and shaking her head in defeat she silently added to herself 'thank heavens we don't have to pose as husband and wife for this venture!' When she opened her eyes Agent Wong had disappeared.

She wasn't sorry to see him gone, but she did wonder how they were going to work together if he wasn't going to say anything.

------

"Fuck yeah . . ." Tokai whispered as he saw the pair of rich girls.

"I dont like this, they look like they've got money . . . but they're girls." Brock said.

"So?" The fiery eyed Tokai demanded.

"Women always _spend_ all their money." Brock said.

"The fuck ever man, we just grab the damn purses!" Tokai said.

"Fenrir won't like this." Brock added.

"But you ain't _with_ Fenrir, are you? You're with Tokai, and Tokai says we take the damn purses!"

Tokai was tall, he had fiery red hair, and fiery red eyes, he was well built though Brock had more mass on him. The muscleheaded kid with dirt smeared in several places of his clothing and more than a little on his face could probably bend steel with his pinkies if he wanted to, but he backed down from Tokai's ire.

Tokai aproached the two young rich girls. They were blondes, it made them idiots. He liked idiot girls.

They were easy to steal from.

They were even checking him out, which made it easier. Brock slammed into them from behind and ran off really fast. Tokai's hands shot out like lightning, he took their purses and walked away slowly, calmly.

The girls realized their purses were gone of course and pointed after Brock, "That guy stole our bags! Someone stop him!"

Tokai snickered to himself, "Fucking women." He said to himself and ran like hell.

**To Be Continued!**

**Author's Note 2:** Some characters here, like Fenrir and Tokai also appear in the story Charlotte's Web 2 by GrimmZ, Fenrir is originally my character and Tokai is originally GrimmZ's, we worked together to make the story line for this fic.


	2. Chapter 2

**Part Two**

------

Slade was laying down staring at the chess board. Sora watched the board intently, waiting for him to make his move.

He focused his eyes and pointed a finger, one of the pawns drifted forward.

Sora smirked and blew gently on the board, one of her pawns moved forward.

Slade moved a knight, Sora moved another pawn.

The point was not to win the game, at least not the game of chess. The point was to see who had their powers under control and who didn't. By moving his chess pieces around one at a time Slade was being forced to focus his power to a small, narrow sphere around each piece and avoid knocking down the others.

It was dificult to say the least.

Sora, who was literally blowing her pieces around had a much harder time of it, so he wouldn't complain out loud, but it was a poor way to train.

The doors to the hideout swung open, there was a chorus of barks and growls from the two large dogs at the door as the fiery eyed hot head and the earth bound muscle mass entered the abandoned warehouse.

Slade smiled weakly at them but didn't say anything, Oyu groaned loudly, "Look out, the hot head's back!"

Tokai scoffed and said "Shut up Puddles, the hell's the boss?"

"We got a good haul!" Brock added, holding up about a dozen purses.

"Well, well, well." Fenrir said, appearing from the shadows, the two large dogs at the door rushed over to their master.

Fenrir was very tall, a little taller than Tokai. He had more muscle than seemed necessary, and long unkempt black hair. Though they were brothers, he looked nothing like Slade, who's short white hair and lightly tanned skin made him the opposite of his pale older brother. Fenrir had a narrow face and dark eyes that made him seem intimidating, whereas Slade's features were actually rather striking, or so he was told.

"You got a good haul? How good?" Fenrir demanded.

"We got plenty." Tokai said shiftily.

"How much exactly?" Fenrir asked, and his dogs growled.

"What's it matter?" Tokai asked.

"I guess it doesnt." Fenrir shrugged. "Except . . . oh yeah, the fact that there's no room in this gang for _purse snatchers_! If you want money we'll _get_ money, but we dont lower ourselves to something so . . . _common_."

Tokai raised his eyebrows, "What you got in mind?" He asked.

Fenrir smirked, "I hear an armored car's going to be going through down town tomorrow. Since that monster attack they want to move some valuble things from the down town bank to the uptown branch, apparently the building was damaged in the rampage."

"Was that you, by the way?" Oyu asked, her blue eyes sparkling with interest.

"No it wasn't, probably some freaky government experiment." Fenrir scoffed.

"Fucking government." Tokai comented.

"Tokai, can you like . . . not swear all the time?" Sora asked.

"Fuck you."

"Maybe if you were less of an ass hole." Sora scoffed.

Slade smirked, it was obvious that Sora would be dating Tokai if he'd just_ try_ to stop swearing all the time. Tokai however took her attempts to change his speech paterns the wrong way and often asked Oyu, being a girl herself, if she knew what the "fucking problem" was with women in general (meaning Sora) and why they always bossed him around.

"Moving on . . ." Fenrir continued, "no other gang in the area has the balls to take this car."

"I resent that remark." Oyu said.

"Shut up." Fenrir said calmly.

"You think only men can be brave?" Oyu demanded. Oyu was always down for a debate about the sexes, especially with Fenrir because she knew him to be downright sexist.

"No really, shut up, I'm not going to discuss this man and woman garbage with you, and I'm not going to be interrupted again." Fenrir said, "Now we've got skills that the other gangs dont have. Won't ever have. We're _special_ and they're not. Time to show off our skills."

"So everyone will know that it was us?" Sora asked after waiting to be sure Fenrir was done speaking.

"You don't think we can take some police?" Fenrir asked.

"I don't think we're immune to bullets, sir." Sora said.

Fenrir looked at Slade, it was Slade's job to come up with the plan. Slade was the tactician, he thought and he planned, he didn't like to get involved, didn't like to fight, but he could plan.

He closed his eyes for a moment and said "Armored cars are never a good idea."

"Chicken shi-" Tokai began, but Slade held up a hand.

"_However_, they're not unbeatable and with our unique talents we should be able to take the car without causing any loss of life." The young man said. He held up a chess piece, "We diguise ourselves and use code names, King, queen, bishop, knight, rook, pawn."

"Dude I'm the knight." Tokai declared.

"I'll be the queen." Oyu said.

"I want Rook, it rhymes with rock!" Brock said.

"No it doesnt." Sora complained. "Anyway I guess that makes Fen the King, so do you want to be the Bishop, or should I, Slade?"

"I don't care." Slade said, "I'll be Pawn, it's just a mission."

"So what next?" Tokai asked.

"Nothing. I'll come up with the battle plan once we get there." Slade said, and he put his pawn back on the board, exactly where it had been, though both he and Sora had given up on the game.

Everyone was talking about taking down and armored car and showing up the other gangs. Slade was wondering why it was even necessary.

------

Maggie surveyed the scene of destruction, had it really been her?

She looked at the ruined downtown area, what a mess.

"Returning to the scene of the crime?" A cheery voice behind her asked.

Maggie turned around and saw a rather pretty blonde woman dressed in black standing behind her. She was probably a few years older than Maggie herself, but still quite young. She was carrying a large black case, "I'm glad to fing you so quickly Agent Mui. I'm Agent Chan . . . I hope we'll be friends."

"What?" Maggie blinked.

"You're agent Maggie Mui of Dokusensha, right?" Chan asked cheerfully, handing Maggie a picture of . . . well, Maggie!

Maggie didn't remember ever posing for the picture, she said "I've never heard of Dokusensha."

"Oh cut the act," Michelle laughed, "we can do this the easy way or the hard way."

Maggie was suddenly very scared. She was a head taller than this woman and still she felt as if she was about to be badly beaten if she didn't comply with the lady's request.

So she did the first thing that came to her mind. She threw a book at the woman!

The pages flew out and a large white wolf materialized , the woman leapt back and used her case as a club, whacking the wolf in the snout.

Maggie turned and ran, her wolf following her, she'd moved maybe two steps when she bumped into a man even taller than her and dressed in black. He had a mohawk black sun glasses.

His hand shot out and he grasped Maggie by the neck.

The teenage girl sqirmed and tried to pry his hand loose, but it wasnt working and soon she'd suffocate . . .

------

Slade heard some commotion and looked down from the building where he and the others were waiting for the armored truck.

There was a boy down there getting strangled by some guy, some woman getting attacked by a dog.

Slade tapped Tokai on the shoulder, the other boy smirked and said "A damsel in distress . . . my super hero senses are tingling."

"I thought you didn't like women, Knight?" Sora scoffed.

"I dont like flat women like you, the babe down there is totally built!" Tokai snapped and threw himself off of the building.

"Idioit, you don't fly!" Sora cried, shoving both her hands forward the winds suddenly picked up and blew upwards, slowing Tokai's descent.

But Slade already had him, his eyes didn't leave the fiery youth as he descended towards the ground at a decelerated rate.

Slade himself leapt over the edge.

_His_ super hero senses were tingling too.

Tokai landed softly on the ground and Slade followed.

"I'll get blondie, you help that dude!" Tokai said.

Slade scowled, why was _he_ the one stuck with the big scary guy?

Never mind, he thrust his hands forward together, then spread them appart.

The man and the boy were seperated, both went flying though the man's landing was rough, Slade didn't throw the victim.

He looked at the boy and suddenly realized . . . he was a girl.

"What's the trouble here?" Slade asked, trying to sound confident and sure of himself like Tokai always did. In reality he had no idea why he was doing this. It wasn't any of his business.

"The hell kind of dog is this, Pawn?" Tokai screamed and Slade looked before hearing the girl's response.

He examined the situation before him, Tokai was standing in between the blonde and the white dog, the dog however seemed not to be moving anyway.

It wa scompletely white, and really he wasnt sure it was a dog, it seemed somehow artificial. The blonde woman was quickly opening her case and assembling something, Slade quickly recognized it as a . . . bow?

Why a bow? She drew back an arrow and said "Surrender now Mui, we're taking you back to Dokusensha one way or another!"

Dokusensha!

Slade knew that name.

He glared at Tokai, "We need to go, this is none of our business!"

"Oh you don't think anything is your business!" Tokai spat, "Where's King? He could get this mangy beast under control!"

Slade was thinking at top speed, the man in black was getting up and he didn't look happy with the fact that Slade had just thrown him twenty feet.

The young man watched as Tokai tried to finish off the dog, and the blonde woman kept her bow aimed at the young girl he'd just saved.

He closed his eyes for an instant, then opened them again and thrust his hand forward.

The woman "fell" onto the wall behind her, dropping her bow.

But she fired her arrow _before_ she fell, and it soared towards the girl!

She screamed and held her hands up, the white beast suddenly melted away and became a big white wall in front of the girl.

Then Slade understood. "She's like us!" He exclaimed.

"Whazzat?" Tokai asked, eyeing the advancing man in black.

Slade wasn't so sure it was the right time to explain, however his heart went out to his fellow freak and though it probably meant crossing Dokusensha he was willing to do so.

He looked at the girl and said "If you want to go on breathing you'll follow us. C'mon Knight, we need to run!"

"What? Why don't we just toast this guy and get on with the plan?"

"Yeah, why not?" Sora asked suddenly.

"You'd better have a good reason for leaving your position little brother." Fenrir said.

"Whoever you all are you're interfering with matters bigger than yourselves!" The blonde woman warned.

"King they're from Dokusensha, this girl's an Unusual just like us!"

Fenrir's eyes blazed, "Shit!" He swore-and unlike Tokai, Fenrir rarely swore-he seemed uncertain for a moment.

Slade knew Fenrir was weighing his options. Kill the Dokusensha agents knowing that they might be under surveilance by others, or lose face by telling the gang to run.

Slade mouthed the word "run" to his brother, and Fenrir complied, "Get out of here, everyone just run, get back home!"

The gang didn't need to be told twice, especially when Fenrir himself turned around and ran as if the devil himself were chasing him.

Tokai however didn't run, "Who the fuck is Dokusensha?" He demanded.

"Just shut up and run!" Slade snapped, he grabbed Tokai's wrist, and then he grabbed the girl's.

She was shaking.

**To Be Continued !**

**A/N:** And here it is, your weekly update for whomever cares.


	3. Chapter 3

**Part Three**

------

Michelle sighed as her target ran off. This meant she'd have to find her again, she really wasn't into the whole chase scene nonsense.

Her partner was it seemed.

He stalked off at first, then broke into a paced run.

She sighed, he'd never catch them like that. She whipped out her cellular phone and called a secure channel.

"Daiten Library, how may I help you?" Was the answer. It was a Dokusensha line, there was no Daiten Library in Hong Kong . . . at least Michelle didn't think so . . .

Michelle sighed a third time, this was really more stress than she wanted, "Hey, is there another unit in zone nine?"

There was a pause, so Michelle added angrily "This is agent Michelle Chan, and I want to know if there are any other agents in zone nine, downtown Hong Kong!"

"Yes there are, we've got a team tracking a pair of Nekekami. Is there something to report?"

"My target has just been kidnaped by a bunch of people who seemed to know about Dokusensha is all, I wanted to know if I should let them live or not. How many Nekos did you say, a pair right?"

"Yes, but I'll contact that team anyway. Whoever it is if they're interfering with your mission assume them to be hostile, eliminate them, Chan."

"As ordered, thank you so much!" Michelle said cheerfully, and hung up on whatever nameless secretary had dared to tell her how to do her damn job.

Were these people Dokusensha agents, that's all she wanted to know.

They weren't.

So they were in fact messing with the agency. People who messed with Dokusensha ended up dead.

Michelle and her perfect aim had helped quite a few of them reach that state. The assassin believed she'd help quite a few more before the end.

------

Maggie didn't know what was going on, who were all these people around her all of a sudden?

There was some guy who tried to choke her to death, some crazy blonde girl who talked about taking her to someone named Dokusensha, a red headed kid who seemed to like to swear, and then a guy who despite his obvious youth had gray hair and seemed to know this Dokusensha person as well.

She was running for her life from the former two with the latter two.

"They after us?" Red hair asked.

"We'd be dead if they were!" Gray hair snapped.

"Do some gravity shit, slow 'em down!" Red hair commanded.

"I told you they're not after us, and I can only affect what I can see!" Gray har said.

"But if they aint after us why're we running?" Red demanded.

"Sometime's I'm wrong." Gray said simply, "Besides, we need to get as far away from these people as we can!"

"Can . . . I ask a . . . question?" Maggie ventured.

"Don't see how it could possibly matter if we die." Gray hair said.

"Who is Dokusensha?"

"People that'll want to kill us, keep running!" Gray said, looking around.

"What? Well the fuck for?" Red demanded.

"Later!" Gray snapped, suddenly he released the Red's wrist and threw his own arm up, a sewer lid flew into the air.

"In." He commanded.

Maggie stared at the sewer. She wrinkled her nose and said "I don't want to."

"Oh you want to die instead?" Gray scoffed.

"How do I know I can trust you?" She asked.

"You cant." Red said calmly, he grabbed her suddenly and threw her down into the sewer.

She expected to land with a splash, she was not disappointed.

The smell was terrible, and she'd probably need a shot after this. She didn't like shots.

Next came Red, and then Gray, the sewer lid slammed shut after he got in and he hurred them on. "Keep moving, don't talk, I don't think they saw us come in here but we're not safe until we get back to King."

"What's so great about dog breath?" Red scoffed.

Gray didn't answer, but down the sewer, about where they'd entered they suddenly heared a loud crash.

Gray frowned and said "Hurry! Don't say anything!"

"Where?" Red demanded.

"It doesnt matter, anywhere!" Gray said.

The three teenagers ran for their lives.

------

Tokai held back a scream as Slade suddenly threw him up a shaft.

He knew it was coming, knew that the sewer cap was already gone and he could freely exit and do his thing.

He just really hated these sudden flights.

And he was covered with human waste.

Son of a bitch he probably smelled even worse than Fenrir's dumb dogs!

Whats more he'd figured out about half way through their run for their lives that the guy they saved was a girl and he'd been unable to say anything cool to her since Slade had said not to talk.

It was easy for Slade, this was the most talkative he'd been in months, but for Tokai who really did need to hear his own voice it was unnerving.

Not speaking left him to thinking and he didn't like to think.

He looked around and saw no one so he whispered "All clear kid!"

Next came the girl, she shot out of the sewer.

She'd be fine as long as Slade could see her, but Tokai leapt out and caught her anyway.

Damn it was good to be so cool.

"Careful," He said in a cool, good guy voice, "You wouldn't want to fall and break something."

The girl blushed and shoved her way out of Tokai's embrace. Ah, hard to get . . . or she was a lesbian. Either way he now had to have her, he hadn't been serious before but now he was.

He shoved the lid back on the sewer after Slade got out. They were in a back alley, Tokai didn't recognize it. He turned to Slade and said "You've gotten us lost."

The kid just shrugged.

"Can we talk now?" Tokai asked.

"You're already talking." Slade scoffed.

"Okay, cool. In that case I'll fucking say that it's too bad Oyu isn't here to hose us off." Tokai sighed. "We're gonna smell like shit Slade, you know that, right?"

"Had no idea sir." Slade sighed. He pointed to a nearby apartment complex, "Let's just take a shower."

"You live there?" The girl asked.

"Someone does." Tokai said.

They walked into the building, for what it was worth they wiped their feet before entering. Slade pulled the doors open with a little gravity, and they entered.

People stared so Tokai said "Hey, no problem right? We just did a fucking shoot for a porno flick is all, Shity Suckers, that's the name, make sure you see our premier eh?"

Slade held out his hand to Tokai, who raised his eyebrows. "What?"

"Here take it, I've got way too much so you can have some too."

"Fuck is it?" Tokai demanded, pressing the button for the elevator.

"It's called "shame", have a bit of it when you address crowds." Slade said.

"I dont do fucking drugs, man." Tokai said simply, waving Slade's hand away. Damn was that why that kid was so smart? Well if you had to be a pill popper to get smart Tokai was happy being simply average. Shame, what a stupid name for it too.

Slade shook his head, mumbled something that sounded like "moron" and pressed the elevator button again.

The girl said nothing. She just looked at her feet.

The elevator came down and Tokai got in, followed by Slade. They waited a moment, then Tokai cleared his throat, the girl looked up and quickly got in the elevator.

"Do you guys know who lives here?" She asked.

"Fuck no. Do you?" Tokai asked.

"No." The girl said.

"Oh. Good." Tokai said happily.

"But isn't that bad? How'll we take showers if we don't know anybody?" The girl asked.

"What's your name?" Tokai asked in return.

"M-Maggie."

"Well Maggie," Tokai said, infusing emotion into his voice to make it seem as if her name were the most pleasant word in the world to him, "the fact is if we knew anybody the mother fuckers had better let us take showers or we wouldn't be their friends anymore, would we? But we don't know any of the bastards in this building, so we can like . . . y'know."

"I . . . I don't know." Maggie said.

"Just go in. Take a quick shower, leave."

"You mean break into the apartments?"  
"Well just a little." Tokai said.

"You guys are robbers?" Maggie whispered.

"Oh hell baby we're everything your mommy told you not to love in a man." Tokai said with a wink. Slade groaned. "We rob from the rich and give to the poor, we fight oppression, we-"

"Swipe purses, right Tokai?" Slade sneered.

Tokai grinned at Slade, "I liked you better when you never talked. What the hell happened to the quiet guy who never opened his mouth unless it was to talk tactics? Sure miss him, this loud mouthed little shit in front of me is gonna get roasted if he don't shut the fuck up."

Slade made a hand motion of zipping his lips.

Maggie, who'd backed into a corner of the elevator and watched both Tokai and Slade nervously finally spoke up, "So your names are Slade and Tokai? But then why were you calling him Knight before?"

"Code name, we super heroes gotta keep our mild mannered alter egos to ourselves." Tokai said. "I'm the Knight, he's the Pawn."

"Like chess pieces." Maggie said.

"I guess so." Tokai shrugged. Was that the game Slade and Sora always played?

"Why are super heroes robbing whoever lives in this apartment?"

"Why not? They never did anything for us, and we're in need. Now they'll have done something for us, so if they're ever in need we'll help 'em out.

"Oh . . . okay." Maggie didn't sound certain, "That's kind of neat." She ventured.

"Yeah." Tokai said. Too bad it was a lie.

The elevator stopped, Tokai didn't even remember pressing a button-he supposed Slade had-and they got out.

They chose an apartment and Maggie whispered "What if they're home?"

"Then we have the honor of getting permission to use the shower." Tokai shrugged. "You want to do it Slade? I'm all . . . gross."

The gray haired boy sighed and punched his fist forward, the door shook, then creaked open.

They walked in, "Okay we've got to be quick, dont know when they'll be back so ladies first." Tokai said. He considered asking her if she wanted company, but he knew that'd be a bad idea, they'd only just met after all and he didn't want to come on too strong.

Especially if she was a lesbian, he'd have to ware down her lesbian defenses if that were the case . . . not that he knew how, shit girls were so damn hot he didn't blame them for liking each other more than most guys.

But he wasn't like most guys, so he figured he had a shot.

Maggie left to take a shower, but then came back, "What am I going to change into?" She asked.

Tokai frowned and Slade said "Just shower with your clothes on."

Really that kid needed to just go back to being quiet and antisocial. He'd just killed Tokai's plan to see what Maggie was working with by "accidentally" going in for his shower too early.

Tokai waited for Maggie to leave, and waited until he heard the shower running before he began to investigate the apartment.

It was sparsely furnished, but there were a lot of boxes. Okay, so these people were either moving in or moving out. Good to know.

He turned to Slade and said "So why'd Dog Breath break and run when you said that name? What was it again? Dorky sensor?"

"Dokusensha." Slade corrected. "Let's just say Fenrir's been going through a lot of trouble to keep us from getting noticed by them."

"Oh hell yeah let's say that. But let's not say just that, let's say why, let's say why we broke and ran from a wannabe punk rocker and a blonde babe I so would have banged if you'd given me the chance! Seriously I'd have her at a motel right now, in bed!"

"You're not a ladies man Tokai . . . deal with it." Slade said calmly.

"Kid I am damned sexy!" Tokai said.

"I wouldn't know. But even if that were true . . . you're a jerk." Slade said. "Women don't like that."

"Okay, fine I'll prove that I'm better with women than you think. I'll bet you I get Maggie in bed before you do."

"See, that's your problem." Slade said calmly, "you're wagering that you'll be first to take advantage of her emotions and her body and you don't even know her. You're assuming that I want to do the same thing you do and I don't even know her."

"You sound like a fucking woman . . . hey you're not . . . y'know . . . that way are you? I mean it's cool if you are, just I aint so don't be hitting on me or nothing." Tokai said.

Slade frowned, "You really are a jerk."

"That means you are then? I didn't hear a 'no'!" Tokai laughed and went back to inspecting the apartment.

Something occurred to him, "Hey you little shit, you didn't tell me about Dokusensha!"

"How could I? You wanted to talk about getting into Miss. Maggie's pants."

"Miss. Maggie? She your fucking school teacher?"

"I call you 'sir'." Slade shifted uneasily.

"Duh, I'm stronger than you, you know I'll beat the shit out of you. Why you calling her "miss?"

"Because it's polite."

"She aint here, she's . . . damn it you're doing it again! Stop changing the subject, tell me about Dorky Sensor!"

Slade's eyes narrowed, "Fine. I'll tell you everything . . ."

**To Be Continued!**

**AN: **Due to inability to log on to the net I have been unable to update this past . . . however long. So double updates for all until I'm back on track, hurrah!


	4. Chapter 4

**Part Four**

------

Sunny Wong might seem like a simple man, and it was true. All that mattered to him was the mission, the mission to get Mui back alive.

Anyone who interfered needed to die, he didn't neet to call his superiors on that one, nobody would dare tell him he was wrong either.

Even if this group were from Dokusensha they were interfering with _his_ mission so that they could accomplish their own and that still left them the problem that they were intefering with _his_ mission and therefore they'd forefitted their lives.

Now he wouldn't be satisfied until he killed them all.

He closed his eyes and used the power of his paper to rip the lid off of the sewer, he leapt down.

The smell didn't bother him, neither did the knowledge that he was traveling through human waste product, all that mattered was his mission. Mui.

And the death of anyone who got in his way.

He didn't know which way they'd gone at first, but then he heard the faint sound of six legs fighting their way though the muck.

He stalked off after that sound.

------

Maggie stepped out of the shower, she'd gone in with her clothes on but it had only made matters worse because her cloths were now wet. She tried in vain to dry them and in the end gave up.

She abandoned her shoes, they were beyond help.

She came out to the room where the boys were and heard them having a quiet conversation.

She was not an evesdropper by nature but when she heard the word "Dokusensha" come up she listened closely.

"So a fucking library want's to rule the world?" Tokai demanded.

"It almost sounds funny when you say it like that. And no, that's not it. This "library" as you call them wants to control the world."

"What's the fucking difference?"  
"Well let's say you rule the world Tokai. You do what? Force people to burn down the forests and order the most beautiful porn stars to your palace every day."  
"Shit it's like you're reading my fucking mind!" Tokai groaned. "You know I like that babe from the movie with--"

"I _so_ don't care. Keep that to yourself. Anyway let's now say that instead the world is under your influence. People _want_ to burn down the trees, something in their head tells them its right, porn stars _want_ to come to your palace because for some reason even the most chaste of girls can't resist, and you never have to openly say anything, the world is under your control because you can affect the way they think by controling the media, all television, all books, all games, even bilboards are under your control and nobody knows it so nobody can try to stop you. That's control. Complete and absolute."

"And Dokusensha wants control?" Tokai said. "Fine, but why does Fen want us to keep away from them?"

"Well think about it. Oyu can control water, Sora can control wind, Brock controls the earth and you can control fire, that's some pretty destructive power."

"So they fucking _need _us." Tokai said.

"No. I know Fenrir's been telling you all this time that you're unique, one of a kind, but you're not. You're rare and unusual, but there are other Fire Masters out there, other Water Masters, even other Beast Masters like Fenrir and other Gravity Masters like myself. Fenrir has been keeping us all safe from Dokusensha because he doesnt want Dokusensha to control the world."

"Okay . . . so then how did he even find out about Dokusensha, did you two like escape from them or something?"

"No. We're not really from Hong Kong,"

"Yeah, you're from America, you fucking told us that."

"That's not true either. Ever notice that we don't have American accents?"

"I dont know what a fucking American accent sounds like, so . . . nope." Fenrir laughed.

"We're actually from Ireland, I'm like . . . a quarter Irish. Slade is an Irish name, it means "quiet child" which is why Fenrir gave it to me."

"Gave it to you? Well shit what's your real name?"

"I dont know. Never heard it."

"So . . . what's that got to do with Dokusensha?"

"Slade is a code name, a callsign, I'm . . . kind of a secret agent for the British Library."

Tokai broke out laughing, "Shit dude, shit! A secret agent for the British Library? You're fucking kidding me! Oh my gosh! You don't have a British accent either, you don't sound anything like that "double O something" dude! Secret agent for a fucking library? Libraries dont need secret agents, you're so fucking joking!"

There was a thunk, Maggie rushed out and saw that Tokai was rolling on the ground, he pounded the floor as he laughed, "Shit! Shit! Shit son you're killing me! Fucking Double O Slade, you don't have a badge you have a library card!"

Slade sighed and watched as Tokai controlled himself and got to his feet. "Yeah . . . nice job getting that much all over their carpeting, Tokai."

Maggie felt compelled to speak up, "Y-you're a secret agent for a library?"

"Yes." Slade said with a sigh.

"So . . . they let you read all the books you want?" Maggie asked.

Slade looked up at her, "Yes. When I'm at headquarters anyway . . ."

"Ch'yeah, go read a fucking book Slade, learn how to come up with more believable stories!" Tokai laughed.

"I'd . . . I'd like to work for them . . . if I could read all the books I wanted to." Maggie said. "I . . . love to read," she added taintively.

"Oh hell," Tokai spoke up, "I love reading, I uh . . . I read everyday."

Slade looked like he was going to say something and thought better of it. Instead he said "I know you hate water Tokai, but get your shower taken care of, okay?"

Tokai glowered at him but finally nodded and departed.

Maggie looked at Slade, "Do you think I can be a secret agent too?" She asked. Maybe then people would like her, maybe then her mother would be proud of her . . . and if she got to read all the books she wanted in the process . . .

Slade frowned at her, he said "I don't think you'll have any choice. Dokusensha wants you, you'll have to eitehr side with us or them ma'am." Slade turned away and began to pace. "I wish it didn't have to be this way, but just for now if you want to live and be free of Dokusensha you'll have to lend us your powers, just as we'll lend ours to your protection . . . I promise."

"It's okay . . . I want to join your . . . gang." Maggie said.

Slade scoffed. Maggie looked at the ground, "I . . . I wasn't always like . . . this." She whispered. "It's just recently . . . I've been having these dreams . . . I can make monsters out of paper . . . and I couldn't do it before. I've been having weird thought's lately . . . is this all for real . . . or just a dream?"

Slade turned to her, "It's real ma'am, I'm real. Dokusensha is real. If you want to join the british library I'm sure they'd welcome you with open arms . . . you wouldnt be the only paper master, the last I heard the very best paper master in the world was on our side . . . of course it's been some time since I've been in contact with HQ, ma'am."

"You don't have to call me "ma'am"," Maggie said, "We're probably the same age."

"It's just polite ma'am--uh, I mean Maggie. Sorry." Slade frowned. He looked away and said "As for your monsters . . . I'll bet you can do more. I'll bet you can do almost anything with paper. My brother and I . . . we can help you learn to use your powers . . . y'know?"

Maggie blushed, "You'd teach me? Even though I can't give you money or anything else in return?"

Slade smiled at her, "You'd be giving us your friendship I'd hope . . . we of unusual talent need to stick together, it's hard for normal people to understand us, they hate us because we're different, even if they dont know about our powers they sense something in us that isnt normal . . . so most of the time we flock together. You'll be happy with us . . . I'd . . . I'd share all my books with you." He said, looking away from her and blushing.

Maggie smiled. Did this mean she'd made friends? Friends with curses just like hers?

There was silence for a while, until Tokai came back from the shower and said "Alright pawn, get a fucking move on."

Slade was about to do so when the wall suddenly crumbled.

Maggie stared, her heart seemed to stop as the man in black from the alley stood where the door had once been.

"Holy shit . . . how'd he find us?" Tokai demanded.

Slade looked startled then groaned, "Foot prints!"

"But the elevator, how could he have known which floor we got off at?" Tokai demanded.

"Do you really think now is the time to discuss it?" Slade demanded, he punched his fist forward and the window exploded, he shoved Maggie forward.

"I-I cant!" She protested, "I don't fly!"

"You will, now get out there!" Slade commanded, he turned to Tokai, "Hold him off until she's on the ground!"

But the man in black would have none of that, newspapers, books, TV Guides, every paper article in the room suddenly came to life, creating a whirlwind of death that prepared to rain down on Tokai!

Tokai scoffed and said "Paper? How wonderfully flamable you stupid mother--" Tokai paused, then glared at Slade, "I'm too fucking wet you fucking idiot!"

"It's called a towel you imbicile!" Slade roared as he shoved Maggie out the window.

She slowly descended to the ground and heard an explosion above. Slade shouted something she couldnt hear and then both were falling out of the window as well.

Then came the man in black, he thrust his hands forward and paper flew from his sleves like a hundred knives, cutting through Slade as he descended.

He kept his eyes on Maggie and Tokai and didn't close them, Maggie felt her heart accellerating, when would she reach the ground?

The man in black used the bloodied pieces of paper he'd already shot at Slade to cut into Tokai, the foul mouthed teen screamed a few profanities and said something Maggie would never repeat about the man in black's sexual prefences.

The man in black however was not held up by anything, he was not being slowed by Slade . . . so he fell far faster than the rest of them. Fell past Slade, fell past Tokai . . . and came to Maggie!

His paper engulfed her, surrounding her, squeezing her but not crushing her. It was splattered with blood and she began to cringe, she closed her eyes.

She felt his strong arms around her and refused to open her eyes, felt him slam into the ground and hoped he'd been killed.

But the fact of the matter was that she hadn't felt any acceleration when he grabbed her, she'd probably slowed him down and saved his life.

The slime.

She closed her eyes and wished for something, anything to rescue her.

And the paper answered her plea, turning on its former master the bits and pieces of paper that surrounded her suddenly shot out in all directions, she opened her eyes now and tried to imagine something that could stop this man. Something big, something strong!

Litter and magazines from nearby stands came to her call, it was just like before with the Cerberous but this time she was in control.

This time she knew what she was doing, she wasnt surprised, she wasnt afraid.

Well . . . she was afraid.

A giant monster formed itself, it was like a big white knight with extremely long arms which shot forward and encircled the man in black.

He grunted but didn't scream when the beast attacked him, he was lifted into the air as the paper began to crush him.

Maggie willed her monstrosity into action, mentally pleaded with it to be strong, to kill this man.

Yes kill him. Crush him, destroy him!

_. . . to elminate the enemies of Dokusensha . . ._

Smash him, annihilate! Maggie grinned and felt a strange happiness overtaking her, "Die . . . die like the dog you are . . . feel the golem's crushing embrace and die!" She whispered with a voice not totally her own.

_. . . we'd let you read all the books in the world . . . if you served us well enough . . ._

Maggie's eyes gleamed, why did this feel so familiar? Why did it feel like she'd done this before?

Many . . . many times.

Like she'd killed a person before . . . and liked it . . .

_. . . trained to be the ultimate weapon . . ._

Suddenly a searing pain shot through her, she fell forward and looked at the arrow protruding from her shoulder.

"I cannot allow a fellow Dokusensha agent to be killed while partnered with me," A familiar, obnoxiously cheerful voice said, "Surrender Mui, you've proved your point, you're tough. Come quietly and I'll recomend you for a quick and painless liquidation."

Maggie looked at her shoulder in terror, she'd been shot!

The pleasures of killing had left her instead she was terrified, confused, what had just come over her? What were the voices in her head?

Her monstrosity fell appart, a crowd of spectators was watching now from what they assumed was safety.

Maggie wanted to prove them wrong . . . had an urge to scare them all away . . . yes scare them, cause panic so she could escape!

The woman behind her said "Come on Mui, you must have been a Dokusnesha agent before, right? Why else would we be taking you in alive, of course you're one of us. So come quietly. Maybe we can be friends . . . you want to be friends?"  
Well yes . . . but not with someone who'd just shot her in the arm!

And where were those other friends of hers? Where were Slade and Tokai?

Had they lied? Had they not really wanted to be her friends?

Where were they?

She looked up at the sky and they weren't there . . . so . . . where were they?

"You must have been a Dokusensha agent . . . otherwise they'd have let me kill you. Not that I want to of course, Maggie dear. I like you. We can be friends. Come quietly, Dokusensha can _use_ a good paper master like yourself, you won't be punished too severely for your insubordination."

_. . . a tool for the use of Dokusnesha . . . a paper master . . ._

Maggie felt something odd happening to her head, it sort of tingled and throbbed like a beating heart.

She screamed and her golem came back to life, it's arm shot out at the woman behind her, there was a startled scream and then the golem disintigrated into a pile of worthless paper.

For a split second that is. Until it came back to life as a giant whirlwind of cutting blades!

Maggie screamed and held her arm in front of her face, not that it'd matter once those blades came down on her!

But instead she heard Tokai shout "Talk about burning love, baby!"

"Who are you?" The woman demanded.

Maggie looked, the sky was full of fire, the paper was all on fire!

Tokai stood amongst the flames looking quite pleased, Slade was next to her, he held his hand in front of her chest and the arrow suddenly shot out of her, Maggie screamed and fell forward, but he caught her.

She wasn't aware of it though, she was tired . . . exhausted . . . sleep was overtaking her . . .

**To Be Continued . . .**


	5. Chapter 5

**Part 5**

------

Tokai winked at the hot blonde, "Baby . . . I hate to have to do this. But like the song says, some times you've gotta smack your bitch up. Tell you what, if I win this fight you'll go out on a date with me, I promise to be good . . . unless you want me to be bad."

"Who are you?" The blonde demanded, clearly not impressed.

"I'm Tokai Boyan, and I'm going to light a fire of burning love in your heart."

"You're a kid!" The woman accused.

How could she? Oh the pain! Tokai was eighteen, perfectly legal adult, this lady couldnt be much older than twenty.

"Age is just a number baby, I'll drill you like a man twice my age!"

"Tokai!" Slade roared, "Stop being a sick and twisted pervert! Miss Maggie's fainted and in case you havent noticed we're kind of about to _die_!"

Tokai felt torn. Kill this hot babe, or hit on her some more and use his sex appeal to turn her over to their side . . . c'mon it should have been an easy choice.

"Tokai!" Slade roared.

Really was unlike him to scream so much . . . and man was this blonde _stacked_!

He couldn't kill her, she was just too sexy . . . had to hit that, he just _had_ to!

And then Tokai felt strong arms grab him from behind and lift him off the ground!

The man, damn he'd been scamming on this woman while her boyfriend was around, how could he be so dumb? Of course no matter how much she wanted him she'd not show it in front of her boyfriend! He had to kill the mohawked mother fucker first.

Then he could bang up the busty blonde.

Well . . . killing him just so he could get with his girlfriend seemed kind of mean . . . damn it Tokai hated it when he got stuck in a chain of thought, this was why he usually tried not to keep quiet for too long.

"Just hold him there Recycler . . . I'll finish off the little gutter mouth."

The woman raised her bow and arrow and Tokai shuddered. He thought hard for something that didn't involve putting a certain part of himself into the blonde woman, and instead noticed the man's hands.

He'd had paper up his sleeve before . . .

Tokai laughed, "Fucking paper is the most useless thing to be a master of! Water will soak you, Rocks will rip you, Wind will blow you away, and Fire . . . well," Tokai gripped the man's wrists and ignited a blaze, "Fire burns you up, ash hole!" Tokai said, pleased with his clever play on words.

The man in black cought fire and roared, the woman fired her arrow but the man dropped Tokai and the arrow instead whizzed by harmlessly.

Suddenly Tokai was falling!

Except he wasn't falling down, he was falling backwards, as if he'd just been standing on a building's wall.

He fell into Slade who shoved Maggie into his arms, "Take her to the hide out, dont let her get hurt and don't take advantage of her just because she's unconcious!"

"I _never_ do stuff like that!" Tokai protested but Slade shoved him forward.

"What are you going to be doing?" Tokai demanded after taking a few steps.

Slade glared at him, "Holding them off, sir!"

"You can't do that alone, you're not tough like me!" Tokai said.

"I told you. _I_ am a secret agent of the British Library . . . this isn't the first time I've fought someone else with super powers. Go!"

Tokai glared, "Your ass better get back to the hide out alive . . . or I'll fucking kick dig you out of your grave and beat the shit out of you until you come back to life, then I'll beat the shit out of you until you die again you little bastard!"

Slade shoved his hand forward and Tokai flew backwards, "Stop wasting time!"

The young man turned towards the pillar of flame which Tokai had made . . . and Tokai looked away, he held Maggie and ran.

Slade was buying them time . . . today he'd woken up into a world bigger than he'd ever suspected and it was Slade's, not his.

Slade knew what he was doing . . .

He'd be okay . . .

But if Tokai didn't get Maggie back to the hide out she might not be, and he wouldnt get to sleep with her fairly and squarely, wouldnt win his bet.

He held her and ran.

------

Michelle scowled as Sunny Wong tore his jacket off, revealing . . . well she couldn't tell, the smoke was too thick around him.

She liked to think he had chisled abbs though.

She saw the foul mouthed boy running off with her quarrey, the white haired boy however remained behind.

She fitted an arrow to her bow and took aim at the boy who held Mui . . . and fired!

Her aim should have been true, should have hit him in the back of the neck, killing him but sparing Mui any true damage.

But the arrow just started to dip and then it fell to the ground with such impact that it broke the concrete.

The white haired boy smirked at her, he aproached her slowly.

Michelle scoffed and fitted another arrow to her bow. She took aim . . . she fired.

He waved a hand and her arrow flew far off into a building.

Wong spread his arms, gathering any nearby paper, but he was suddenly flying backwards, himself slamming into a wall!

Michelle was annoyed now. This target was an Unusual, how did headquarters not know about this kind of activity? He couldn't be Nekekami because he wore regular clothing and the sick neo ninja organization loved their black coats . . . really Michelle would suspect Sunny Wong of being a Nekekami if not for fact that he obviously had been assigned to this mission by HQ.

Therefore she could trust him to handle this nuisance while she went after the real target. "There's nothing I can do, so I'll leave this to you, I'm going after Mui!" Michelle said and gathered her assassin's equipment.

She wondered how long it would take her partner to kill the boy, and it was while she wondered this that a large and rather mangy dog appeared before her, snarling and growling.

She paused and tried to walk arouind it, and failed.

She decided to turn around, and there was another.

"Like my boys?" A sinister voice asked. "I didn't appreciate you shooting at my little brother . . . that'll get ya killed."

Michelle turned to see a man who was quite clearly a Beast Master, given his elongated canines, and the scars on his face . . . not to mention the rather large dogs snarling at her.

She smiled pleasantly, "So what organization are you with? Who is intruding on Dokusensha's territory?"

"You can always ask the devil, since you'll be in hell soon enough." A rather pretty young woman said, Michelle responded immediately by drawing back and preparing to fire an arrow at this woman.

And she was blown away, slamming into the beast master who wrapped his arms around her in a terribly unwanted bear hug.

"Maybe I'll just hold you here while my boys eat your guts right out of your belly, hmm?"

"You can't be rogues. Four Unusuals?" Michelle said, trying to keep her cool.

"Six actually." The beast master laughed, "Feel outgunned? Good. Because your little Dokusensha operations in Hong Kong . . . we're going to bring them to an end."

"Are you Nekekami?" Michelle pressed.

"Wouldn't be likely to tell you if I was, would I?"

Michelle smiled, "You can tell little old me."

The dogs came over and snarled at her some more.

"I'll tell you this much . . . I'm no friend of yours."

Michelle scoffed. "But I can be such a _good_ friend. Do you want to be _good_ friends?"

"Oh kill her already, Fenrir!" The pretty Wind Master demanded.

She had long whispy blonde hair and wore white clothes, Michelle made a face at her.

Where was her partner?

She heard someone yell, she turned quickly to her partner's direction and saw his opponent lying on the ground in a rapidly growing pool of blood.

She smirked, "Looks like mister Wong is through."

"Slade!" The wind master gasped.

Michelle took the chance she was given, both the beast and wind masters were distracted so she quickly drew one of her arrows from the quiver at her hip and lunged forward, she slammed the arrow forward like a spear towards the wind master's heart!

This woman after all, was not to be brought back alive, only Mui was needed alive.

Michelle's arrow head was milimeters away from the girl's heart when she turned, perhaps she'd noticed Michelle's movement from the corner of her eye, she thrust her hand forward, hitting Michelle in the stomach and Michelle flew backwards.

But her arrow didn't, it was stuck in the wind user's chest.

Michelle smirked before she hit the ground, she rolled and came up on her feet, she drew out her bow and she turned to run. Wong had the situation under control, he didn't need her!

And her job wasnt to throw down with special agents of an enemy guild, her job was to get Mui, and right now she felt a strategic withdrawl would be the best way to reach those ends.

She heard the dogs coming after her, she drew her bow and leapt onto the hood of a parked car, she turne around as she leapt back onto its roof, she spotted a dog and she fired an arrow, she didn't stay to see if it hit she turned and ran some more, but the pained yelp she heard told her she'd hit her mark.

As always.

Michelle was a top Dokusensha assassin after all.

**To Be Continued . . .**


	6. Chapter 6

**Part Six**

**-----**

Slade saw the blonde woman dash after Tokai, and he meant to stop her but when he turned his back on the man in black he'd die, he knew that.

So he stood firm and glared at the man in black, he was the real threat.

He'd have to trust Tokai to deal with the woman . . . oh who was he kidding? Tokai couldn't handle a Dokusensha agent, not one with blonde hair and big breasts anyway!

He shoved his palms out and twisted them around so that they were upside down, the man in black began slowly at first to levitate off the ground, then he caught speed and fell upwards into the sky!

He might have continued until he left the range of Slade's effictive influence but he swept his own arms out and paper wings errupted from his black jacket-which was made of paper gathered from the streets, how he changed its color was a mystery to Slade.

The paper master flew back towards the ground, the wings were like razor blades.

The paper master scowled at him, he was only ten feet off the ground now and Slade withdrew his hands, causing the paper master to plummet to the ground!

Slade smirked, he knew the paper master had been too close to the ground to be seriously injured, but he wanted to bet that the fall had hurt all the same.

The Dokusensha agent got to his fit and shoved his hand forward, from the sleeve of his jacket errupted a huge white claw, it streaked towards Slade, who immediately increased the gravity, dragging the claw downwards.

But it had enough speed to reach him before it slammed into the ground, the boy kept his eyes on the paper claw then threw his hands up into the air, reversing the gravity again and sending the arm up with lightning speed.

But he blundered.

His plan had been to allow the arm to get close, or rather long enough to reach him, he'd then make it light enough that it'd float up into the air, he'd then bring gravity back with such force that the unrealistic stack of paper would fall on its master and cover him while Slade himself got away.

Unfortunately the arm got just a little closer than it should have, and as he let it rise it cut a large and terrible path across his raised arms, slashing one of his wrists.

He withdrew his arms and closed his eyes in pain.

He closed his eyes and the gravity effects on the paper arm ceased, it was free now to slam into him, free to kill him.

He opened his eyes quickly, hoping to somehow prevent his own death even though he couldn't think over the rising panic building in his chest, had he been able to think clearly he might have noted that he'd been alive for an awfully long time since he lost concentration, the arm should have finished him by now.

As his opened eyes gazed upwards the massive arm was gone.

He looked at the ground, at the mass of soaked paper and smiled weakly.

Oyu.

The water master ran out from behind Slade and stood in front of him, "I don't know what gang you're with, but if you keep trying to hurt our quiet friend here you'll be all washed up."

Slade saw the paper master scowl again and thrust his other arm forward, and he might have had even more paper up his sleeve, though it was dificult to believe it was possible . . .

Except a huge golem rose up out of the very road behind the man and grabbed him around the middle, lifting him up.

A white blade emerged from his sleeve, it sliced through the golem's head cleanly, luckily Brock's golems didn't need their heads to see their prey.

But the fact that paper had cut through the golem so cleanly gave Slade more than a small bit of worry.

This agent seemed unstopable, what would it take to make him give up? Now he was outnumbered, he couldn't possibly have _more_ paper, but he did.

Had there really been _that_ much litter in the streets?

Slade shuddered, his hand wouldn't stop bleeding and he was starting to feel faint. He said to Oyu "We can't fight him, we have to run away . . ."

"Y-yeah . . ." The older woman said, backing away from her opponent and helping Slade to his feet at the Dokusensha agent proceeded to cut Brock's golem to bits, "I think you're right!" She screamed as the golem fell appart, Brock's control over it brought to an end.

Wherever Brock was, he'd be smart to run too.

If only Slade's legs didn't feel so heavy . . .

------

Sora moaned as Fenrir helped her to her feet, "Don't take it out!" He snapped at her, "We'll get you taken care of." He looked at the arrow protruding from her shoulder, and shook his head.

A blooming bow and arrow! Only a damned Dokusensha agent . . .

His boys were after the tramp now, and Tokai was probably headed for the hide out. Slade seemed to be capable of walking now as Oyu tried to lead him away but they wouldnt get far before the paper master caught up to them.

Fenrir scowled, he shoved Sora towards a nearby car, "Get it going."

"H-how?" Sora gasped.

Fenrir stared her and realized with a groan that it was Oyu who knew how to hot wire cars.

Damn women, why couldnt they all posses the same capabilities?

He glared at the paper master, strategy was Slade's arena, fighting was what Fenrir did best, and even so he was useless without his boys . . .

He shook Sora, and it probably wasn't a good idea but his mind was a lump of mush right now, he shouted at her "Then blow him around until Oyu can hot wire a car! Brock! Brock wherever you are get to Sora and do whatever it takes to keep him away from her!" Fenrir roared at the top of his lungs.

He ran towards his little brother and Oyu.

The woman whose hair always looked as if it had just come out of the shower was practivcally dragging Slade when Fenrir reached them, Fenrir took his brother and threw him over his shoulder, "Get us some wheals woman!" He commanded, and for once she complied without complaint, grabbing a bit of rubble that had flown over to them from Brock's destroyed golem and hurling it through the window of a van.

She went to work, Fenrir turned around and kept his eyes on the paper master who was busy fighting off a second stone golem as the wind blew violently all around him.

Unfortunately he stood fim as if the strong winds were nothing but a midsummer's zephyr. Paper that flew about in Sora's strong winds in fact were being added to the paper master's aresnal, they seemed almost magnettically drawn to him!

Fenrir looked back at Oyu who was busily working on hot wiring their escape vehicle, he turned back and saw the paper master thrust his arm towards the golem, and suddenly it collapsed and crumbled to the ground, paper flying everywhere . . .

How could paper cut through golems made of concrete? Fenrir didn't understand it at all, he clenched his fists and shouted at Brock, "Make another, quick!"

The stocky man looked at Fenrir in dumbfounded shock, "I cant!" He screamed back, "I-I'm trying and it's not working!"

Blast! So he was out of energy!

Fenrir looked around, there were no people in the streets, the battle had driven them all into hiding, so there were no dogs he could take control of and so he was useless in this fight. He set Slade down on the ground, and slapped him, "Slade! C'mon Slade, I need you to kill him! I need you to crush him!"

"C-cant . . ." The boy groaned.

"Yes you can!" Fenrir roared, "Kill him Slade! Crush him! Destroy him!" Fenrir pressed, urging his brother to act.

Slade just shook his head slowly, "Thou shalt not kill . . ." He grumbled, and Fenrir hit him again, this time not to rouse him.

"Idiot, you have to kill him or he'll kill us, do it this once Slade, damn you!"

Slade looked like he might slip out of conciousness so Fenrir hit him again, Slade's eyes opened slightly and hardened, "If you're mad take it out on him!" Fenrir commanded, "Kill him Slade, you're the only one who can!"

Slade glared at the paper master and weakly he raised his bleeding arm, he held his hand open then clenched his fist quickly, the man in black suddenly stumbled and fell, the ground beneath him giving way and collapsing and he fell.

Slade's arm fell limp and his eyes rolled back into his head, but he was still breathing.

The van started up and Oyu laughed triumphantly, Fenrir shoved his brother into the vehicle and got in himself. "Drive over to Brock and Sora, and make it quick, woman!"

"Yeah, yeah, you're welcome by the way." Oyu scoffed.

"I'll thank you when we're safe, damn it!" Fenrir roared, he didn't bother to close the door to the vehicle.

Brock and Sora leapt in, Sora screamed as she did, and Fenrir saw that the clumsy girl had accidentally broken the arrow shaft off in her attempt to escape.

That'd make getting the arrow head that much harder, well he wouldn't scold her about it now, he slapped Oyu in the back of the head, "Drive!"

"Jeez! Yeah boss, fine!"

"I'm so not kidding with you, drive the car!" Fenrir roared as, beyond all reason the man in black began to climb out of the crater Slade had made.

But Oyu floored it, and the small van surged forward towards safety . . . or at least away from almost certain death.

Fenrir sat back and panted, he glanced over at his brother to make sure the kid was still breathing, then said to Oyu "Get us back to the hide out."

"But Slade needs a--" Oyu began but Fenrir cut her off.

"Do it!" Fenrir roared, "That's where Tokai will go . . . we have to get him before we do anything else . . ."

**To Be Continued . . .**

**A/N:** Though this story is generating few reviews it does have several hits, so either I do have a group of readers or one person who can't stop rereading everything. Thanks to those of you who are reading the adittional chapters and giving me the benefit of the doubt. Or . . . the single solitary person who re-reads every chapter dozens of times uh . . . yeah.

Thanks!


	7. Chapter 7

**Part Seven**

* * *

_Maggie sat in her room reading. She was happy when she read. She knew it was nearly three in the morning and she'd not been to sleep . . . but she wanted to finish this book._

_She was never happy when she wasn't reading. She loved imagining the things in these books were true, that maybe she could escape and have a happy life, maybe somehow she could have a happy ending just like these characters in the books._

"_Subject is responding well to negative reinforcement?" A woman's voice asked, breaking into Maggie's concentration . . . that was odd. Usually once Maggie began to read she could sound out the whole universe, somehow this voice cut into her and snatched her attention._

"_Yes ma'am." Maggie's mother answered. "It's hard sometimes, she really seems like such a sweet creature."  
"She? You're not getting attached to _it_ are you?"_

"_No ma'am, it was a slip of the tongue, sometimes it's hard to remember what it is ma'am. After all she-_it_ seems so . . . human." Maggie's mother said._

"_Has it begun to manifest its powers yet?"_

"_There are subtle signs ma'am."_

"_Have you seen it manifest its actual power, has it animated anything?"_

"_No ma'am." Maggie's mother answered._

_Who was she talking to? What was she talking about? Maggie could hear her voice through the door but she sounded strangely sober, she even sounded a little nervous._

"_Where is it now?" The strange woman asked. There was silence for a moment, and then the woman said "Ah . . . very good."_

"_It can be dificult to do at times ma'am, but I have kept as close an eye on it as I've been ordered to do. I . . . I'd dare to say I've been _more_ observant than you asked, I've done very well." Maggie's mother said._

"_You're certain it's restrained?"_

"_I . . . I don't understand."_

"_You're certain it couldn't come out and kill us both right now?" The woman demanded._

"_Like I've said ma'am, it has not manifested any ability yet, and it really is a sweet creature, I don't think it would _attack_ us. Anyway it should aslee--"_

"_Shut up." The woman snapped. Maggie waited for her mother to explode and put that woman in her place, nobody ever said those words to her in this home . . . right? So why was her mother so quiet?_

"_The project is failing, I've liquidated six failures this past month alone. Project oh tripple sev will be deemed a failure if it does not manifest by the end of the week. It'll have to be liquidated too. Do whatever you must to get it to manifest . . . you have my permission to become physically abusive, anything you feel is necessary, perhaps if it tries to defend itself against you it will finally show us some results."  
"But . . . but I--"_

"_Your pay will increase substantially if you manage to force manifestation, and if you _are _injured you will be adequately compensated."_

"_Yes ma'am. Are . . . you leaving?"_

"_In a hurry to see me gone?" The woman laughed, "Yes I should be going. I've two more projects to check on, and three more liquidations to complete before I can finally close my eyes for the day."_

"_Don't you want to visit with it before you go? I mean if I were in your position I'd want to at least look at it before I left-" there was a sharp intake of breath from Maggie's mother and the sound of someone being slapped hard._

_Maggie almost opened the door to see what was happening._

"_If you fail . . . I'll see it then. I'll look into its eyes as I liquidate it. I'll force you to watch too, since you seem to be rather fond of it." The woman said coldly. "Good day."_

"_Y-yes ma'am. G-good day." Maggie's mother said shakily._

_Maggie held her legs to her chest, what the heck was going on out there? Did she dare open the door and peek?_

_She heard the door to their home open and then slam shut so whomever the company was had probably left. She heard her mother muttering to herself, "Liquidate this, liquidate that, why don't you just say "kill" instead of trying to sound so scientific?" Suddenly and without warning the door opened, hitting Maggie in the head._

_She fell back and heard her mother shout in fury, "Still awake? After I told you to get to sleep hours ago?"_

"_I-I'm sorry." Maggie said, "I-I heard voices and it woke me up . . . who was here just now?" She asked. It was a lie, she hadn't been to sleep yet but at least if she claimed to have been woken up she might not get yelled at quite so viciously as she would if she admited she'd disobeyed._

_She was wrong._

_Her mother's eyes became wild with rage and the older woman sprang forward, "There were no voices you stupid little trash! You idiot, you idiot, you damned idiot! Get in bed now, go to sleep!"_

_Maggie would have loved to . . . if her mother weren't strangling her._

"_Can't you just do what you're supposed to do? Can't you just do what I need you to do just once?" The older woman screamed, "You stupid little idiot! You'll kills us both if you keep this up!"_

_And then came the blows, for the first time she could remember Maggie was being violently beaten by her mother and she had no idea why. Surely staying up late wasn't all _that_ bad . . ._

_But her mother kept hitting her and screaming at her, Maggie wasn't sure when it would ever stop, or even _if _this woman who seemed to be taking sick pleasure in hitting her would finally stop, it occured to Maggie that the only way to make it stop might be to fight back._

_She tried to hold her mother back, tried to keep the woman away from her but she didn't have the strength, she tried to get away and was shoved into a pile of books._

_As she fell her books came apart, the paper flew up and surrounded her as if it were forming a wall or a shield._

_If only . . . if only . . ._

_She curled up in a ball, holding her legs to her chest and she cried, fantasies weren't real, the paper wasn't protecting her, she was just frightened and scared, her mind was playing tricks on her. She was wishing that it something would save her and she knew no person in the world would care enough to do so, so of course her sickly imagination had dared to hope that the books she loved might._

_But that wasn't possible. Not to mention a pathetic hope at that._

_Sure enough she felt the pages of her ruined books begin to float down as gravity dictated they must._

_She wept and held out her hand as if it could possibly hold her mother away, "Stop it!" She pleaded, "Stop it! I'm sorry, I won't ever disobey you again!"_

_She heard her mother laugh cruelly, "Heh-heh, I guess we've both had enough for tonight . . . but you make good on your word girl, you obey or you'll get much worse than you got just now, I'm not playing games anymore. I've had it up to here with your insolence, you're a worthless little failure!" Her mother said and headed for the door. She turned back just before closing it and said coldly, "Prove me wrong Maggie . . . or before long you'll get so much worse than this you'll wish I'd _killed_ you tonight."_

_Maggie nodded and cried, it was weird but . . . even though she'd been scared to death that her mother_ would_ kill her . . . a tiny part of her thought 'do it already . . . put me out of my misery'_

* * *

Maggie's eyes shot open and she sat up . . . she was lying in on the ground, propped up by some pillows.

She looked around, she didn't know where she was.

"What is _it_?" She whispered, gasping for breath.

Saying those words hadn't been a conscious decision, they simply tumbled out of her mouth when she woke up.

"It?" A familiar voice scoffed, "Shit baby I don't know what you're talking about. You okay though?"

Maggie looked at Tokai, he was standing next to a window and looking out, "No sign of anybody . . . I thought for sure Fen and the others would have gotten back by now and I'm starting to get worried about Slade."

"S-Slade?" Maggie whispered, "What happened to Slade?"

Tokai scoffed, "Wish I knew sweet heart. Anyway fucking kid can take care of himself, he _is_ a secret agent y'know." Tokai said with only a slight joking tone to his voice.

Maggie lied down on the stack of pillows and sighed, her whole body hurt but her shoulder hurt the most. "Where are we?" She asked.

"Fell Hound central, this is our base . . . it's an old church, y'know? Dont fucking ask me what religion 'cause I don't know. But there's some cool statues and stuff. Nobody comes here anymore though . . . anyway the others should be back soon and we'll figure out our next move."

"What about Dokusensha?"  
"I don't know baby." Tokai said, and he grinned at her, "But I won't let anyone lay a finger on you . . . I'll be your guardian angel."

Well gee . . . that was nice . . . it made her feel like maybe she was worth something . . .

"You wanna fool around while we wait?" The boy blurted, and Maggie's eyes narrowed.

"Do what?" She asked, backing away from him slowly.

He frowned and sad quickly, "I was just kidding, hey, hey calm down I wouldn't do anything, I'm no fucking pervert no matter what Slade says!"

Maggie nodded, but she kept her distance.

"Sensei . . . should I kill them now sensei?" A woman's voice rang out from the rafters.

"Now, now," A man replied, "If I wanted them dead I'd have done it myself by now."

Tokai hissed and his hands began to smoke, he looked around, "Who's there?"

Maggie gasped as a girl fell down from the ceiling and landed flat on her back next to her.

"Ouch! Master Jun I fell!" The girl pouted.

She was younger than Maggie by a year or two, she wore all black and had several gold and silver anklets, though her silvery hair was tied into two buns at the back of her head there was still enough of it to come down her back and over her shoulders, her eyes flashed yellow for a moment and then turned gray.

"Damn it Han, don't you know Spirit Cats are supposed to land on their feet?" A man sighed. He wore a white nehru jacket, the sleeves adorned with golden rings similar to the girl's anklets, he had a gun in his hand and Maggie froze in her place when she saw it.

He looked much older than Maggie, maybe he was in his thirties, he pointed the gun at Tokai and then holstered it, "Easy . . . we come in peace . . . more or less."

"The hell are you?" Tokai demanded.

"The hell? The hell? That's one hell of a stupid question, can't you start it with "who" or "what" so we know how to answer? Master Jun what do you need these two for? I wanted to have dinner we've waited in this stupid place all day, I missed lunch, I'm hungry and I-"

The man smiled and spoke over his female companion at first, though once she heard he was speaking she silenced herself, "Who the hell are we? I'm Jun, this is my lovely if somewhat talkative apprentice Han. We're here as friends . . . we'd hoped to stay hidden until your leader, Fenrir returned but as Han says we've missed lunch and if she doesn't eat soon she'll get hungry for blood and . . . well let's just say we'd have to mop you two off the floor and Fenrir might not believe us when we say we're friendly."

"What? I don't drink blood master-oh you're trying to be intimidating . . . sorry." Han said as Jun glared at her.

Maggie looked at these two in surprise, what the heck was wrong with the world she was living in, "Do you two work for Dokusensha?"

"Dokusensha! They're a bunch of book worms and losers, and I for one find it offensive that you'd dare to compare us to-"

"No my dear," Jun said, cutting his apprentice off again, "We're not Dokusensha. We're Nekekami," He said with a bow, "Japanese organization of the ninja, Spirit Cats, a guild far weaker than Dokusnehsa and your British Library . . . but don't assume that that means Han and I are persons to be trifled with. Give this message to Fenrir and you'll have no problems with us." Jun said, handing her an envelope.

"Fine, he'll get it." Tokai scoffed, "Now unless the lady needs some loving, get the fuck out of our hide out."

"Quite a mouth on that one! Master Jun let me take his tongue out, please?" Han asked and she moved like a flash, her hand shot into the black trench coat she wore, then whipped out again.

A throwing knife sunk into the wall near Tokai's head, Lo-Chun's eyes narrowed, "Damn it," she said, then quickly corrected herself, "Uh I mean I missed on purpose, that was a warning, do not speak profanely in my presence . . . uh let's go eat something master, I'm hungry!"

"Will you be able to aim the food towards your mouth properly?" Jun scoffed.

"I said it was a warning shot!" Lo-Chun protested. "Anyway you haven't seen the last of us, we'll be back!" Lo-Chun assured them as the two walked out of the room, Maggie heard her saying "I've _always_ wanted to say that master, it seemed a properly villainous thing to say, was it good?"

"You'll never make a good assassin until you learn two valuble lessons, Han. The first one is _shut_, the second one is _up_, only when you master the art of putting them together could you become a master assassin like me."

Tokai stared at the door after they left then looked at Maggie . . . "Uh . . . okay I don't know about you but my world just got a little weirder."

Maggie shrugged, and it hurt to do so.

**To Be Continued . . .**


	8. Chapter 8

**Part Eight**

Michelle leaned back in the large comfortable chair and sighed. "A bath. A bath would be lovely right now." She thought out loud.

Not shower of course, a bath. A long . . . warm . . . relaxing bath.

She waited patiently in Dokusensha's district headquarters, after her escape she'd received a call on her cellular phone ordering her to report.

She'd been waiting in a large, comfortable lounge for about an hour now, and she probably reeked of combat . . . she just wanted a bath.

It was about the time she began to wonder why cats didn't like baths that she realized she'd been falling asleep, she heard the loud slamming of the door as agent Wong walked in. He was organized and collected and the first thing Michelle thought was, _He's taken a bath._

The little attendant behind a desk noted agent Wong, and brightened at once, "Ah, Recycler!" He said, Michelle stiffened, he hadn't even given her the time of day! "Now that you're here as well please take your partner to the conference room."

Wong set off without even looking back at Michelle, and it was with a bit of strain that she forced herself out of the comfortable chair to follow him.

"So what's waiting for us in the conference room, do you know? I just got a call demanding I show up here." Michelle said.

Wong . . . perhaps predictably, said nothing.

He reached a pair of large doors and stood still, Michelle reached out to push them open but they swung wide on their own.

The conference room, she supposed. It was darkened and it smelled like cigar smoke.

The little director that had sent them on their quest was there too but everyone else was in shadow. He waved for them to come closer and they did, Michelle took a seat after agent Wong did so, not sure about procedure . . . she'd never attended a meeting of high ups. This wasn't the highest of course, but these _were _important people.

"Ah, agent Chan, special agent Wong, good to see you both in one piece. We understand you engaged your target?"

"Yes sir." Michelle said.

"Any comments?"

"More of a suspicion really. She was a Dokusensha agent, wasn't she?" Michelle asked. There was some uncomfortable shifting in the shadows, and Michelle felt she'd been dead on in her guess.

"Why brings about this curiosity?"

"You want her alive. She's obviously an Unusual, and a paper master as we all know, making her about a rank C or at the best a B. She's not nearly powerful enough to warrant forceful integration into Dokusensha's special units and unless she knows a dark secret-in which case simple assassination makes the most sense-she's not a threat to us. Bringing her in alive makes no sense unless she's a former agent. She must have betrayed us, the amount of Unusual support she received when we tried to apprehend her supports this, you want to know who she talked to and what she told them, correct?"

"Well . . . no. You're wrong, agent Chan."

Michelle stared blankly. He couldn't be serious.

"Agent Michelle Chan, what you are about to hear is classified, it does not leave this room. Special Agent Wong has already been briefed on the situation."

Michelle fought the urge to pout. So Sunny already knew? Well it made sense, he was a Special Agent and she was just a hit man . . . uh, hit woman.

"This," The director said, pressing a button and bringing to life a small three dimensional image of a room full of perhaps two dozen children, "is Project Paper. As Dokusensha struggles to find a way to replicate the powers of Unusuals we here in Hong Kong joined several other branches in an attempt to begin the creation of Paper Masters."

Michelle understood, just a single Unusual like Sunny Wong could do a lot of damage, if Dokusensha could use Unusuals as shock troops, mass train and mass produce them they could easily seize the advantage in the war against other agencies.

While the Japanese, the British, the Russians, the Americans and the Australians all fought to _find_ Unusuals to field against each other Dokusensha would simply _make_ its own super weapons.

It was brilliant, but then again it was Dokusensha.

"As experiments continue to inject Unusual abilities into agents genetically, we here began a cloning project. Taking DNA from historically great paper masters, and combining it with that of some of our top agents we were able to create several litters-if you'll excuse the expression-of paper masters."

Michelle stared at the picture, the children were all very young, between five and six.

"We bred exactly one thousand for the first generation, all yielding mixed results. Three hundred and twelve showed the potential to become Paper Masters, the others served no purpose for us and had to be liquidated. Of the three hundred survivors Mui, or Project Oh Tripple Sev, is the last."  
"The last?" A man in the darkened part of the room asked, "I was under the impression that there remained forty or more projects, I was shown zero seven zero one just last week and found her to be quite satisfactory."

"It." A cold woman's voice said, "It. Oh Triple Sev and Oh Sev Oh One look like young girls but they are not, they are manufactured product, they're as human as blow up dolls and you used Oh Sev Oh One in the same manner. Not that it was good for anything else in the end since it failed utterly to manifest. It was liquidated two days ago."

"Even so it was a waste to kill her." The man said glumly. "She had such a cute smile," He said with a wistful sigh.

Michelle blinked, had she just heard that right? Was a Dokusensha director pining for a blow up doll's smile? What the heck were they talking about? She was completely lost! Weren't they talking about her target? Why were so many numbers being thrown around?

"It was a waste that _it_ ever came into being," The cold woman's voice hissed back, "and I don't give a damn about _its_ smile."

"Agent Sung please, we're not here to argue about whether or not these little creations are human, and the majority of us here would rather not hear about Director Hori's delinquent dalliance with Oh Sev Oh One." The little man that had assigned Michelle her mission said.

"Of course. My apologies, Director Zhu."

Zhu nodded, "Now we _are_ here to discuss the progress of Oh Triple Sev. Agent Chan and Special Agent Wong engaged Oh Triple Sev in combat moments ago, as you know and Oh Tripple Sev has manifested. We believe she or it also manifested the three headed monster that ravaged downtown Hong Kong."

"Well it was to be expected, wasn't it?" Sung snapped, "It was always one of the most likely to manifest."

"Why so?" Michelle asked.

"Because Mui has the most complete set of Paper Master DNA. That of our own Sunny Wong."

Michelle gawked, "So she's like your daughter!" She cried.

The tall man scowled beneath his sunglasses but remained silent.

"How did you father such a child?" Michelle demanded.

"He did not father anything, Miss. Chan, special agent Wong's DNA was taken for the project. Because he had then yet to distinguish himself only five clones were made with his DNA information, and only one of them, oh triple sev, also had the genetic information of another of our special agents. However on a level I suppose one could say that genetically she is the daughter of Sunny Wong and Arisa Sung."

"That's not what I meant though," Michelle said, "The girl before me today I would guess she's about seventeen right now? Agent Wong does not look old enough to have fathered a seventeen year old daughter."

"Oh Tripple Sev is nobody's daughter!" Sung snapped, "We must not begin seeing these _things,_ these constructs as people, it will cloud our judgement when the time comes to do what must be done. Now, Oh Tripple Sev is indeed far younger than it appears, but then isn't that the miracle of genetics? We were able to hatch it at a useful age, eight and begin testing. Its growth has been twice that of a human child until last year when we slowed it down and installed a new memories for it."

"New memories." Michelle repeated. Now she was lost.

"As part of the operation we planted our projects into society complete with identities and agents to pose as a family, their minds were wiped of their experiences before and new memories were given to them."

Michelle raised he hand, "Why? What about the five years of training?"

"The five years were nothing but study, the training was meant to come only for those who could manifest during the year that followed." Sung said, "Mui is the only one to do so."

"However Oh Tripple Sev has been showing us some anomalies as well." Zhu pointed out.

"Yes. I have been in contact with the agents posing as its family. Mui's memory programming may not have been properly handled, or may not have been complete. It remembers things that it shouldn't be able to remember."

"Explain." Zhu said.

"Yes, if she remembers Dokusensha why is she fighting us?"

"I never said it remembers Dokusensha. Anyway Mui remembers having a sister, or so it claims. It often inquires about her, its surrogate parents were forced to tell it that this sister had gone away to college, however Oh Triple Sev was planted in a home where it would be an only child, there is no evidence of error on our agents part, Mui somehow remembers at least one of its fellow projects from phase one.

"Intrigued I arranged for Mui to be shown pictures, a mixture of worthless photographs with a selection of staff and fellow projects from phase one thrown in to see what she could recognize. It was reported as having been overcome with fear upon looking at the pictures of doctor Maeda her creator, and myself, though it showed minimal recognition of anything else."

"Perhaps a deep seeded fear of you stems from your treatment of it during phase one?" Hori offered.

"Exactly what I think. I was responsible for the discipline of most of the projects, the fear of Maeda leaves me uncertain, though it is known that Mui severely injured doctor Maeda a week before it was given new memories."

"What exactly transpired? Was Maeda abusing Mui in any way?" Michelle demanded. "Maybe the girl was defending herself."

"Possible. It was during its liquidation that it brought the papers of Maeda's clipboard to life and slit his throat. He survived and Mui was taken from the list of failures to successes at the last minute. She'd displayed the necessary ability, now she only needed an altered memory."

"Wait, why, if she could display ability was her mind wiped?" Michelle demanded, "That's taking three steps forward and ten steps back!"

"Not at all, the paper control was pure instinct for them, they could only use it subconsciously, willfully controlling the paper was our goal for these children, but so was loyalty to Dokusensha, which was what phase two was all about. Finding the successes and making them loyal agents."

Michelle nodded. It sounded like a big fat failure to her. They'd brought one thouand human begins into life. Maybe they were clones, maybe they were just constructs but Mui looked to her like a real human girl. It was hard to think of her as anything else.

So a thousand little boys and girls had been born and one by one, maybe ten by ten they'd been discarded, murdered because they weren't what the agency wanted. Only one was still alive, only one had displayed any actual ability, producing an unusual in one out of one thousand projects over several years was definitely not effective.

But it was Dokusensha . . . Michelle felt a little uneasy with the idea that Dokusensha could be wrong.

'No.' She thought, 'Not wrong. Dokusensha is correct, however the agents carrying out the orders were sloppy.' Michelle thought.

She remembered the picture of all those little children . . .

So damn sloppy . . .

"Couldn't any of the projects have been salvaged for other work?" Michelle asked.

"Some were." Zhu said, "Some displayed extraordinary traits, or traits in common with their other genetic halves, rather than the paper masters. One of them is serving as my personal assistant, though it isn't going well."

"Why is that?" Michelle asked.

"His health seems to be deteriorating, it may be because he's cloned from incomplete materials, though Mui's health was reported as poor when she was last examined as well. That's why we need to get our hands on her, find out what we can just in case our time with her comes to an end." Zhu said.

Michelle nodded.

"Now agent Chan . . . if you were to capture Mui what would you need?"

Michelle thought on it. "Alive sir?"

"Yes." Zhu said.

"Have you asked Agent Wong this question?" Michelle asked.

"Yes." Zhu repeated, "We disagree with his assessment, we want yours."

"What did he say." Michelle asked.

"He wanted you removed and he wanted permission to bring her in without arms." Zhu said with a dry smile.

Michelle nodded. "So arm removal is out of the question unfortunately." She joked, "Very well. I will require four units of regular agents and at least one unit of special agents. I will need the agents that acted as her parents. Do we have any footage available of the Unusuals I encountered today? Good, I'll need it." She said, responding to Zhu's nod.

"This is quite a task force." Sung said. "I cant agree to this."

"We don't _have_ four units available right now." Hori agreed.

"Then what can you give me?" Michelle demanded a bit too rudely.

"Continued use of Special Agent Wong and the aid of Special Agent Sung. A Special Agent named Ijori, and a Special Agent named Jin. Four well trained special agents are the best we can give you."

"How many are Unusuals?" Michelle asked.

"Wong and Ijori. Sung and Jin are very capable though." Zhu said.

"Sir are you seriously suggesting giving command to _agent_ Chan?" Sung demanded, leaning over her table into the light. Michelle was amazed by how like an older version of Maggie that woman looked! "What makes Chan worthy of leadership?" Sung demanded.

"The fact that I have just promoted her to Special Agent," Zhu said crossly, "and the fact that of everyone available to deal with the issue she does not have any agenda or grudge. She will perform her duty clearheaded and calmly."

Michelle felt her chest swelling with pride. She was a _Special _Agent now!

"Sir, I think I have a plan. But I _will_ need the agents who acted as Mui's parents." Michelle said.

"Done." Zhu said, "Her mother is yours. The man who acted as her father is dead however, a fact we've tried to hide from Mui until now."

"Just a minute!" Hori cried, "We havent agreed to this Zhu, you cant just assing _another_ agent to this task force!"

"And why not?" Zhu asked, "Have you seen the footage? They'll be facing down against at least four Unusuals, likely more. I am taking no chances, a force that size suggests this is the work of the British or the blasted Russians, the deaths of four Unusuals would be a blow to any agency, I want to see it happen."

"Yes sir." Michelle nodded.

"One last thing," Zhu said, "Mui's apparent fear of Sung. It may cause her to attack Sung."

"Yes sir, I was already considering how best to use that when I heard you mention her name." Michelle said.

"Well don't. See to it that Mui does not injure Sung.." Zhu said.

"Yes sir." Michelle nodded.

"Then we're through here." Sung said, "Let's get going."

Michelle nodded. The whole meeting had just gone over her head but . . . she was a special agent now, and in charge of her own task force.

This was going to be wonderful!

**To Be Continued . . .**


End file.
